I think the Congresspeople who proposed it should have to be the first to staff it.

(What do you mean there's no oxygen?)

We tried this in the 80's. We thought we were gods.

As it turns out when the second rocket was sent back to collect the corpses^H^H^H^H^H^H^H erm... important experimental apparatus, they were still alive. Our leading theory is that they had produced enough gas to allow them to survive an extended period in vacuum. What we cant explain is how the didn't rupture with the pressure differential.

Of all the stupid, hare-brained ideas we've seen, this one has to be the stupidest so far.

We're close to exponential runaway on government spending (borrowing more, and more often). The economy is barely moving despite drenching it in money, jobs are part-time with no benefits, we jail more people than China, the government plainly tramples over all our civil rights, oil is running out, tax law is a joke, IP law is a joke, immigration law is a joke, H1B visas are a joke...

...so of course let's put a park on the moon!

I'm half inclined to start a new political movement: the "Boot" party.

Let's give these people "the boot" - vote the incumbents out! Keep turnover high until we get good people who can accomplish something worthwhile.

So, how about revising the Boot a bit? We don't need to keep recycling people in and out of office to have a workable system, in that respect you're absolutely right.

How about outlawing lobbying altogether, and demand that incumbents be left alone to do their job? That sounds like a good idea. Oh, even better, how about, when you hold a public office, you're expected to do that job, and it is expected to be a full time job - so we could mandate that while in office, you may not have any other for-profit act

Don't forget to add that politicians should be monitored whether the laws they create "accidentally" aid companies where they go after they leave office to get comfy jobs where they don't do jack for a few millions a year.

Sure, we can arbitrarily tighten the noose until they comply or stop running for office, whichever is fine with me - the end result just has to be that unbiased-good-for-all-of-us decision has to become the norm.

You don't *put* a national park *anywhere*. You *declare* an area a national park, because it has some particular quality or value that needs to be protected. Sometimes, as a result of this, you set up information stations and things to assist tourists, but that's entirely secondary.

You think that when they created the Northeast Greenland National Park they went around putting up a fence and souvenir stands?

We're close to exponential runaway on government spending (borrowing more, and more often). The economy is barely moving despite drenching it in money, jobs are part-time with no benefits, we jail more people than China, the government plainly tramples over all our civil rights, oil is running out, tax law is a joke, IP law is a joke, immigration law is a joke, H1B visas are a joke...

The economy is barely moving because we're clawing our way back from the worst recession in generations, and the governmen

No that they have taken care of the celestial matters, perhaps they will find some time for actually running the country. Banal earthly matters such as the farm bill apparently requires some attention.

There's 435 voting representatives and 100 senators. Despite Congress's ability to get any real meaningful work done in Washington as a whole due to partisan politics, it's still entirely possible for individual members to multitask and work on multiple works of legislation at the same time.

Somehow the effort required to setup a lunar national park that most likely would have minimal if any opposition to as well as likely unenforceable (at least outside the US and maybe inside as well) is significantly easi

Yes, let's spend time in the House of Representatives debating a bill establishing an international landmark on the moon because we got nothing better to do.

We have not seen a federal budget passed in how long? Ten years I recall. We got federal agents selling guns to drug dealers. These drug dealers then shoot federal agents. The economy is crap. We've seen an ambassador and his security detail get murdered. Government employees are openly lying to Congress and keep their jobs instead of ending up in

The United States Department of the Interior listed a location outside the nation on the National Register of Historic Places: the oldest American embassy [wikipedia.org]. The Apollo sites are certainly as worthy of preservation. They should be listed as historic landmarks.

Hasselblad, who made some of NASA's photographic equipment, used to run adverts offering free cameras to anyone who was prepared to go and pick them up. These were, of course, the Hasselblads left behind by the astronauts on the lunar surface. And now this bunch of do-gooders wants to put all the Apollo artefacts off-limits! Has the camera offer been cancelled? I feel betrayed!

The lunar landing sites are historically significant. At the very least there should be a policy in place that all space agencies, private and public, should recognize these sites and possibly protect them. At least make it so the lander base, flags, experiments and vehicles must not be disturbed, moved or vandalized. In the future if there are regular commercial visits people will try to take artifacts back for collection.

As for a national park: NO. The USA nor any other country or agency owns the moon.

It's good to see our government working on important things. Things like making a national park in a place we're incapable of reaching right now. Doubly so since there's nothing else for our government to be doing right now.

Aren't all artifacts left by the Apollo missions still considered US property and therefore still protected by federal law? As far as I know, the US government never relinquished ownership, and therefore no additional protection is needed.

All this does is add unnecessary bureaucracy and administrative costs. Once this "park" is set up, the artifacts will have to be catalogued, regulations drafted, lawyers proficient in space law consulted -all this will be non-trivial expenses for little benefit.

But how is anything the UN says gonna affect private enterprise? And do all countries obey UN mandates? I have a feeling the value of those relics to private collectors means the UN can say WTF they want, sooner or later SOMEBODY is gonna grab 'em.

Countries are subject to national laws. Countries are all part of the UN, and even the ones that aren't can be more or less forced to go along with it by the ones that are.

do all countries obey UN mandates

Insofar as anyone obeys the laws they themselves have agreed to follow (which, I take your point, is not as often as one might hope).

sooner or later SOMEBODY is gonna grab 'em.

So... making an effort towards later rather than sooner is probably worthwhile.

Certainly the UN is only as capable as its member states, who are only so capable, and eventually I'm sure law and order will break down enough for whatever reason that anyone who feels like it can go pillage historical artefacts from everyone else. But for the moment we try and avoid that.

There isn't an infinite time horizon solution. We could simply say 'free for all, first come first serve' and let the artefacts get sold, but eventually notions of private property will break down long enough for someone to steal them from their owner of the day and if they have bigger weapons than the other guy, I guess that makes it legal. But for as long as there is lawful authority (insofar as such a thing exists at all) we can make laws to try and do the best possible for now, and when we're dead the next group of people can deal with whatever their problem of the day is. Lets face it, if they find the 25th century equivalent of oil under the apollo landing sights, they're getting moved to museums, and I wouldn't begrudge my greatx20 grand children whatever choice they think is best. For the moment 'don't touch' seems like the best bet.

If a private space entrepreneur does the job of flying to the moon, collecting the artifacts, and returning them before the US government gets its act together, perhaps ending up in his private collection is a fitting outcome.

It would be cool to do a sort of "street view" simulation based on high resolution scanning and photography. For example, you could have a small vehicle that would "hop" over the site at low altitude, making multiple passes from various angles, downloading the data to earth between hops. You would want to repeat the whole process a few times to catch the scene from different lighting angles, etc., but eventually you'd have enough data to reconstruct the whole area in fine detail. It would be a lot of fun to

Small problem with that theory is that the items are still U.S. government property by international law/agreement. Taking them without permission would constitute grand theft and the U.S. would most likely be willing to go to war to get them back, given their significance.

Not particularly, and that was never the case anyway. It was always a space race, an attempt to beat Cold War enemies. With that rationale gone, NASA lost much of its support.

This is an important detail that seems to be glossed over. NASA's development prior to the 80's was a way of developing technology the military needed that was too "big" to be kept classified. Big rockets were needed for big nukes. Putting spacecraft into orbit and being able to control those orbits was necessary for spy satellites. Skylab was about countering concerns of manned space spy stations from the Soviets. The moon shot was half cold-war PR and half critical military technology development.

"Big rockets were needed for big nukes." -- at least this was factually incorrect by the time NASA came around in 1958. The military originally developed the Saturn I, predecessor to Apollo's Saturn IB and Saturn V in the late 50's/early 60's but gave it up to NASA when they determined that they had no military use for a rocket that big -- the nukes were coming down nicely in size. When the military later needed boosters bigger than their biggest ICBM (Titan II) they independently developed the Titan III

You are right, UN mandates are only as strong as the guns that support them. And, since most of the world believes as you do that private ownership supersedes public, you can rest assured that those "grab them" claims to ownership will be defended. Wouldn't it be nice if we could all just get along?

Personally I'd love it if they stayed there but I'm also a realist, and 1.- those things won't last forever in the nasty conditions on the moon,solar winds and little meteors and the like will trash them, which IIRC scientists said the flags might last 300 years, and 2.- To a private collector those things will be worth a fortune and as we have seen time and time again if there is enough money on the table SOMEBODY will claim it.

But just FYI I don't think private ownership should be the end all be all, I

“The government would also have to submit the Apollo 11 lunar landing site to the United Nations for designation as a World Heritage site.”

I'd think they've got a legitimate case for that being accepted. Terminology gets a little interesting though, with "World" referring to the moon as well.

I'm not sure the attempt to be designated as a World Heritage site is an acknowledgement of the fact that the Moon isn't American property, I'm willing to bet that most UN World Heritage sites exist in some country's territory.

I'm looking at this with a very sympathetic eye, but at best this is a naive, but good hearted attempt to establish some precedence for protecting the Apollo landing sites before a serious commercial interest gets involved, an attempt that doesn't realize you can't declare a national

You can declare a national park any place you want. Preventing access to others is another thing.

In this case if a private company tries to steal this stuff you can either prosecute or declare the Apollo 11 Site has become the Lunar Atomic Range. I doubt anyone would risk a swift nuking to steal some artifacts.

Oh but it is! Here, this terrifying truth was uncovered right here on slashdot, but since the Democrats have been trying to cover it up, many haven't heard. The current generation needs to read this, so I'll repost it now.

The Moon - A Ridiculous Liberal Myth

It amazes me that so many allegedly "educated" people have fallen so quickly and so hard for a fraudulent fabrication of such laughable proportions. The very idea that a gigantic ball of rock happens to orbit our planet, showing itself in neat, four-week cycles -- with the same side facing us all the time -- is ludicrous. Furthermore, it is an insult to common sense and a damnable affront to intellectual honesty and integrity. That people actually believe it is evidence that the liberals have wrested the last vestiges of control of our public school system from decent, God-fearing Americans (as if any further evidence was needed! Daddy's Roommate? God Almighty!)

Documentaries such as Enemy of the State have accurately portrayed the elaborate, byzantine network of surveillance satellites that the liberals have sent into space to spy on law-abiding Americans. Equipped with technology developed by Handgun Control, Inc., these satellites have the ability to detect firearms from hundreds of kilometers up. That's right, neighbors.. the next time you're out in the backyard exercising your Second Amendment rights, the liberals will see it! These satellites are sensitive enough to tell the difference between a Colt.45 and a.38 Special! And when they detect you with a firearm, their computers cross-reference the address to figure out your name, and then an enormous database housed at Berkeley is updated with information about you.

Of course, this all works fine during the day, but what about at night? Even the liberals can't control the rotation of the Earth to prevent nightfall from setting in (only Joshua was able to ask for that particular favor!) That's where the "moon" comes in. Powered by nuclear reactors, the "moon" is nothing more than an enormous balloon, emitting trillions of candlepower of gun-revealing light. Piloted by key members of the liberal community, the "moon" is strategically moved across the country, pointing out those who dare to make use of their God-given rights at night!

Yes, I know this probably sounds paranoid and preposterous, but consider this. Despite what the revisionist historians tell you, there is no mention of the "moon" anywhere in literature or historical documents -- anywhere -- before 1950. That is when it was initially launched. When President Josef Kennedy, at the State of the Union address, proclaimed "We choose to go to the moon", he may as well have said "We choose to go to the weather balloon." The subsequent faking of a "moon" landing on national TV was the first step in a long history of the erosion of our constitutional rights by leftists in this country. No longer can we hide from our government when the sun goes down.

The lesser light reference was introduced in 1953, six years after the Roswell aliens gave the Democrats time travel technology and fertilizer. All editions of the Bible were retrofitted to make this new satellite agreeable to proper God fearing Republicans.

Nope. But the Brits did. So pack your crap and move out, the redcoats wanna move in again. You can pack your third amendment too, while you're at it.

Snide comments aside, when will humanity learn that "but I was here first" means exactly jack when it comes to land claims. How far back do you want to reach to determine who owns it? Should Europe belong to Austria, for they pretty much held a sizable portion of it in the 18th century? Or maybe the Germans, after all the Holy Roman Empire, which contained pretty much all of central Europe, was ruled by German Emperors for most of its existence? Maybe the French would be more fitting, after all Emperor Charlemagne ruled nearly all of Europe in 800. Or the Mongols? I mean, considering how much of it was conquered by Attila before? Or Italy, owning it to the Roman Empire? Maybe Greece would be fitting, considering they settled almost all over those parts of Europe that border the Mediterranean Sea. Or... who is the legal successor of the Celts again?

Forget "I was here first" as a claims to land. You might find out that someone can say that to you, too.

Actually the US has some rather "straightforward" laws about National Parks - which are also places like the Lincoln Memorial (I think they file those under National Heritage) and places that are important to the military.

And while I totally agree that they can't really enforce it outside the US, it does actually go a long way to defining what can and can't be done there by US companies. So, actually, I think that this is a great idea. It probably takes next to no time to propose in parliament, will likely

Not necessarily. It could be more like the difference between negligence and willful negligence.

You are arguing that "willful negligence" is not negligence at all.

Not thinking too hard about something necessarilyencompasses not caring about it enough to think about it. Which is not to say that not thinking about it equates with not caring about it. If you are going to split hairs for no good reason at least try to be correct.

You've misidentified the hairs I've split.

Let's look at it from the POV of a political candidate for office. I have two different speeches in front of me. One has broad appeal, but really won't motivate my base, and I'm fairly confident that even though I'm saying the right things I won't persuade many registered X voters to vote for me because I'm the Y party candidate.The other speech is a little irritating to the other side, but will get my base out of their houses and into the voting booths. Ultimate

always insisting the US must do things to make everybody like us no matter whether the actions will have long term negative effects

The opposite of that is what spawns the terrorist boogeyman. You're deluding yourself if you think anything is done, that does not directly or indirectly put money in the pockets of those in power. Whatever people feel about the Americans as a nation, it is completely of your own doing, and invoking long term negative consequences as a boogeyman works both ways. The only significant difference in either school of thought is when the negative consequences manifest themselves, stop doing shit for profit all t